This past Saturday, I was fortunate enough to attend the Harvest Dinner with Tepuy at Hazelfern Cellars. Tepuy Dining is named for a famous flat topped mountain in the Amazonian Jungle, and is a Venezuelan inspired Traveling Pop Up led by female chef Adriana Urbina (Food Network 2017 Chopped Champion). Tepuy was featured as one of “the best Venezuelan places to eat in NYC” in 2015 by Eater New York times. I was really intrigued about the idea of pairing Venezuelan flavors with Northwest ingredients and Hazelfern Cellars wine.
If you haven’t heard of Hazelfern Cellars before, they are a relatively new entry into the Oregon wine scene. Based in Newberg, Oregon, this family owned vineyard officially started making its small lot wines in 2014, growing from the original 5 gallons of Pinot Noir and a Portland basement has grown to over 500 cases of wine. One of the things that really stands out about Hazelfern is that head of the family and winemaker Bryan Laing is a huge food lover as well, and is really in tune with balancing flavors and textures in wine just like balancing flavors and textures in food.
